Archive for February, 2009



So how much are unpopped kernels costing your business? »


| by Shyam Subramanyan on February 13th, 2009 | No Comments »

According to the Onion unpopped kernels cost U.S. Billions ever year.  I myself don’t let the unpopped kernels go waste.  I chew them into submission when I am too lazy to stick another bag, right side up, in the microwave. Yes, I know.

This got me thinking.  How much are unpopped kernels costing me in my business?  They are those anonymous visitors that come to my website.  They come back multiple times, clearly looking for something, and sometimes get tantalizingly close to telling me who they are.

Many businesses don’t think too much about unpopped kernels.  They assume that at some point the anonymous will reveal themselves.  This approach has the risk of losing the prospect completely. There should be consistent efforts to:

  • Understand what percentage they are – 15%, 35%, 60%?
  • How long does it take to convert someone from anonymous to known?
  • Be active in conversion.  What are they looking for? Can their content consumption history tell us more about what can be offered to them to help reveal their identity?

Getting back to popcorn, here’s the real story behind unpopped kernels and what scientists are doing to make them all pop.  While I don’t like unpopped kernels on my website, I actually enjoy some in my popcorn.

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Posted in Audience Marketing, Marketing, Strategy, Web Presence Management



When SEM can be injurious to your health »


| by Shyam Subramanyan on February 10th, 2009 | No Comments »

SEM seems to be that magic pill that’s exactly what the doctor ordered.  The thinking goes like this.  Google seems to be making fistful of dollars on it, so it should be working for businesses that use them.  The competition uses SEM and “we can’t be left behind”.  If people click and come to our site, “we have a qualified prospect”.  It only cost me “pennies”.

SEM in a bottle

SEM Warning!

Like the warning on the medicine label, SEM can have be downright injurious to your health if taken on an empty stomach.  What do I mean by that?  Before you spend money on SEM, put yourself in the shoes of your prospect.  Your prospect is not going to get “sold” by just visiting your website, however impressive it may be.  She is going to look at validation from the external web – your web presence that is beyond your own website.

In order to experience your web presence yourself, do a quick search on your own business and see what comes up.  Hopefully the first hit is your own website (If not, you have some serious SEO work to do).  If the next few entries are:

a) Your own aborted entry in Wikipedia marked as “maybe an advertisement”, or

b) A press release from 2003 announcing a version 1.01 of your product, or

c) A link to a LinkedIn company page that does not show a strong team, or

d) An industry article or blog entry that mentions your product with negative comments (or even worse with no comments), or

e) A discussion forum showing disgruntled customers, or

f) all of the above,

you might be ingesting SEM on an empty stomach.  Your prospect, now aware of you, thanks to SEM, is now put off by what she finds (or doesn’t) about you.  She’s a blip in the radar, never to be found again.  Your pennies spent on SEM now cost you a bundle by chasing a perfectly good prospect away – maybe for good.

So before you take the SEM pill, make sure your are not doing it on an empty stomach.

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Posted in Audience Marketing, Marketing, Strategy, Web Presence Management